I’ve already poked fun at Herman Van Rompuy, the nondescript über-bureaucrat who has risen to the non-elected post of European Council President. I’ve mocked Rompuy’s attempts to compete with other European politicians, and I encourage everyone to have a good laugh at this video of Van Rompuy getting eviscerated by a British MEP.
We now have a new reason to roll our eyes about Van Rompuy. He is whining about those mean, nasty bond traders who have decided that it is a somewhat risky proposition to lend money to Europe’s welfare states. Even though Van Rompuy has no experience with money (other than spending the fruits of other people’s labor), he imperiously thinks it is “absurd” to put Greece and Portugal in the same category as Ukraine and Argentina.
I guess he would prefer if everyone just pretended these countries were in good shape and able to pay their bills, sort of like a fiscal version of “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”
Here’s the relevant passage from an article in the EU Observer.
European Council President Herman Van Rompuy has lashed out at ‘bond vigilantes’ over the treatment of peripheral eurozone economies in recent months. Speaking in London after a meeting with Prime Minister David Cameron on Thursday (13 January), Mr Van Rompuy described recent events as “absurd” and said the likes of Greece and Portugal should not be treated the same as poor countries: “Recent market developments are sometimes rather strange. The spreads now show default risks for some eurozone countries bigger than for emerging countries like Ukraine or Argentina: that is absurd.”
